The cost of living for me in 1978 Phoenix, Arizona


Every once in a while I ponder the cost of living. So of course today I'm pondering the cost of living in old-time Phoenix, so I'll time-travel back to 1978, when I was actually there, at age 20.

Unlike my mom, who was always looking for bargains, and could have never been a very successful contestant on the TV show "The Price is Right", I had no idea what things cost. For the first eighteen years of my life my parents paid for everything, like food, shelter, clothing, and I never paid even the slightest attention to what it cost. I wonder if many kids do?

Anyway, other than knowing that comic books had gone up from twelve cents to a quarter, you really couldn't have got much price expertise from me back then. Since I had been pondering moving away, I distinctly remember that one of my friends told me that rent for an apartment in Phoenix would be the staggering amount of three hundred dollars a month. That sticks with me, because there would have been no way that I could have afforded an apartment with a part-time minimum wage job. But it turns out that my friend wasn't right, at least not for me.

My first apartment was $150.00 a month. It was a tiny one-room (no bedroom) apartment near 7th Street and Indian School Road, which I moved into in 1977. Yeah, not the most ritzy neighborhood, but it was fine for me. I suppose if I had looked in Scottsdale, it would have been more, and my friend, who grew up with a lot more wealth than I did, would probably not have accepted what I did. So, in a way he was right.

Minimum wage, by the way, paid $3.25 an hour, so it took a fair amount of hours for me to make rent. As I recall, I was pleasantly surprised at how cheap food was at a grocery store - I just remember hearing my parents complain about how expensive everything was getting back when I was a kid. The only exact amount that I remember was a can of beans, which cost a dime. I ate a lot of beans! But don't feel sad for me - I liked beans, especially with hot dogs, which I boiled, and ate with ketchup (no bun). I didn't get fat on that kind of food, but it kept me alive and happy.

The car I had got great mileage, but required premium fuel, which must have been about fifty cents a gallon. The engine was a tiny one, and I don't recall what kind of mileage it got, but it was like a motorcycle, it would run for miles and miles on very little fuel. I commuted for the first year I attended at ASU to Tempe from my apartment in Phoenix, and have no memory of ever worrying about gas. I also loved driving, especially with the top down in the winter, so the distance of the commute never really bothered me, either. I did move to Tempe during my last year at ASU, which was convenient, but I missed the driving.

Probably what shocked me the most was how cheap green olives were. As a kid, I was told that they were as precious as gold, and I even would ask for a big jar of green olives for Christmas (really!). When I found that I could afford them easily, I made sure that I always had some. I have a nice big jar of green olives in my refrigerator right now!

Thank you for time-traveling with me back to 1978!
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